My first daughter is nearing her first birthday and I have to say I’ve had quite a year; looking back on everything, I can’t believe time has passed so fast. Coming up on her first birthday makes me reminisce a lot about the very beginning when I first realized I was pregnant, so I thought maybe I could share my experiences with other first time moms or seasoned mamas and see the similarities and differences.

When I was growing up, I always imagined what it would be like to be pregnant, knowing there was a little human being inside you. I imagined I would have a sense that something was different before I even had confirmation that I was pregnant, so I was surprised that when I was staring at the positive pregnancy test all by myself, in my bathroom that, besides shock, I felt pretty much the exact same as I had an hour before. I don’t know exactly what I was expecting, but I really thought I’d feel something different and I honestly didn’t. When my husband came home and I shared the news he immediately took me in his arms and stated how happy he was and I still didn’t feel much. So, a couple of weeks later we went to the doctor and had our first ultrasound to confirm the pregnancy; of course this early on you don’t hear a heartbeat you just see it beating on a screen as they’re probing you uncomfortably. So, once again I expected to feel something different and I really felt nothing–it was so awful, I have to admit. My husband saw the heartbeat and started crying and so did the nurse and I’m sitting here trying to fake an emotional reaction, but it just still didn’t feel real to me. I only felt like a bad mom for not having some sort of reaction.

The next weeks that passed were honestly pretty mild as far as first trimesters go; I was ridiculously and utterly exhausted. I mean I could have slept for days if someone let me. I would take a nap for two hours and then less than an hour later want another one. I was fortunate to be working part time at this point, so my employer didn’t take notice to my lack of energy. This is something that honestly no one told me about; I always heard about people throwing up and feeling terribly nauseous, but no one warned me how exhausting it is to grow another human being inside you. It literally takes everything out of you.

Thankfully, I didn’t have much nausea; there were a couple of weeks where everything smelled gross and I had to take little bites of food so I wouldn’t throw it up, but thankfully that was short-lived.

Finally, when I went to my three month appointment, I got to hear the heartbeat and that’s when everything seemed more real to me than ever. Something about hearing your baby’s heartbeat for the first time makes your heart and your world stop. It was the first moment I really got the feeling that–hey, I am going to be a mom and I will never forget it.